Appearances matter, and this doesn't appear good: Penn State is heading toward concluding that Michael Mann's role in Climategate is all a big misperception, a matter of appearances more than substance.

I have looked over the Penn State University report issued today, titled: “RA-10 Inquiry Report: Concerning the Allegations of Research Misconduct Against Dr. Michael E. Mann, Department of Meteorology, College of Earth and Mineral Sciences.”

Below are eight points addressing my initial impressions, in the order they appear in the report (with one bracketed exception from page 4, moved up slightly in order of appearance here).

My takeaway is that the panel revealed most of what we need to know about the ability of this internal inquiry to credibly assess charges of misfeasance. They limited their evidentiary pursuit — outside of select blogs and media reports — to speaking with Mann, aided by a supportive NAS report (to the exclusion of the Wegman Committee report, inexplicable including for a factor cited, below) and one panel member interviewing ex parte two Mann supporters.

This approach did not do themselves or their institution any favors.

1. This is simply a point of interest, but in describing the CRU e-mail cache that finally shined a light on Mann’s practices so as to bring the sort of scrutiny that can yield direct professional consequences, the panel chose the word “purloined,” vs. “hacked” or “stolen.” (P. 3, p. 5)

This is an odd word choice in the general style and vocabulary of the document, and I am guessing that this was selected as the most neutral term; even if it includes “to steal,” the word also contemplates the actions of a suddenly unwelcome “whistleblower” — that erstwhile celebrated creature which the facts available indicate was the source of the documents long-sought under the UK’s freedom of information law. (P. 3)

2. The panel considered the NAS report that Mann’s suspect practices had prompted, but not the Wegman Committee Report. (p. 3) The University’s odd decision had already been noted by others for its sheer incomprehensibility. Even CRU emails acknowledge the importance of reading both, not one of them. No inquiry, even threshold, can be credible if it excludes that detailed assessment of relevant behavior even if it addresses work predating Mann’s tenure at PSU. The same is true of the NAS report the panel reviewed.

3. Just as a point of interest, I was struck by the panel’s inclusion of this assessment in a ten-page summary of two-months’ work. “Throughout the interview, Dr. Mann answered each question carefully…” Also on page four, they noted, “In addition, Dr. Mann provided a ten page supplemental written response to the matters discussed during his interview.”

4. In the in-person interview, “He explained the content and meaning of the emails about which we inquired;” (P. 4)

It is problematic that they only interviewed Mann to reach a threshold determination. If the content and meaning of the emails are important, as is implicit, then why would they not speak to the authors of these important emails mentioning him, and many others not written by him, which made the final cut for scrutiny and assessment?

Consider this in a judicial context and you see the curiosity of calling in Mann but only Mann to explain what other people wrote and meant. Happens in trials all the time.

Um, like when the authors are dead.

5. “He explained that he never used inappropriate influence in reviewing papers by other scientists who disagreed with the conclusions of his science;” though I note that this does not cover Mann pressuring others re: reviewing and publication. This seems sort of relevant, even if he did also issued a blanket denial of any inappropriate behavior.

6. “On January 22, 2010, the inquiry committee and Dr. Brune met again to review the evidence, including but not limited to Dr. Mann’s answers to the committee’s questions, both in the interview and in his subsequent submissions. All were impressed by Dr. Mann’s composure and his forthright responses to all of the queries that were asked of him.” (emphasis added) The assertion of Mann’s “forthrightness” alone, given inter alia the panel did not, as noted above, apparently interview others necessary to make such a determination (outside of one panel member meeting ex parte with two well-known Mann supports, see bottom of page 4), is troubling. But I suppose that’s what internal inquiries and other self-policing often produces.

14 Comments, 14 Threads

Of course PSU is going to clear Mann. After all, he’s on the progressive side of the issue. That’s what really matters after all. It doesn’t matter if his methodology is false, or his if conclusions are based on incorrect data, he’s right on the issue and his reports support the far left’s agenda to take over and derail modern civilization. That’s all that truly matters.

For a decade prior to climategate, it was widely known that mann refused to submit his data for public review, and even then, some folks were finding significant statistical errors.

Its unrealistic to expect a university that, in the service of socialism has been harboring mann’s un-scientific religious commune, will suddenly admit that they have been at best ignorant enablers of academic fraud, and at worst co-conspirators.

The sheeple have no mechanism for evaluating scientific methodologies, and until the thought leaders tell them its over, they will have faith in mann.

I wonder how many universities even have professors and administrators that are not ‘warmers’ and have any inclination whatsoever to place academic excellence above ideological service.

There was a time when a Phd was understood
to have a professional calling, just like an MD;
Greater authority and responsibility in balance.
Since this is clearly no longer the case, it is
a good thing we have the Web to keep them honest.

I think this is what the RICO act was created for. Of course with this justice department in power this will never happen so it’s time to think long-term.
The first step is to get rid of all Democrats at all levels, as there are no moderates left in that party. Once we do this then we can pick off the RINO’s as they come up for re-election.
Then we can reverse all this nonsense this government has done. The key is to go to the polls on election day in-mass so the elections can’t be stolen. It can be done!

This is no surprise. Typical liberal academia bs which we have come to expect. I will predict that you will see a “double down” on Global Warming in much the same way that Obama is “doubling down” on healthcare. In spite of being proven factually wrong. In spite of massive resistence by the public, our elites will simply keeping lying to us. Hoping that if you keep lying over and over again, it will become true!! Where is our fact checking media to seek out and print the truth? The day is soon coming when the public will finally lose all confidence in academia, science, and the government. A new breed of politician will emerge and the youth of America will wake up to these lies no thanks to their parents and the other people who should have protected their future. What a disgrace!!

Michael Mann joined Penn State’s faculty in 2005. Much of his climate research occurred before then, while a professor and researcher affiliated with University of Virginia from 1999 to 2005. I don’t see why UVa shouldn’t conduct its own investigation into Mann’s work & other actions to determine the nature and extent of any violations of its standards and policies. Penn State needn’t have the last word on this matter.

I saw the Penn State report as well: they basically were mostly concerned with not being targeted as well by badly confused or right wing numbnuts, which apparently include alumni and politicians, hence in so many words, the report says: “That email hack did not show anything wrong with the behavior and Mann and the others, and has no impact at all on the current scientific consensus on global warming. We already knew that, but some of our alumni and political friends have been completely suckered in by all the idiotic right wing BS and p*iss-poor media coverage so we decided to waste time and effort anyway to appease them with a calming report and a suggestion that it was all just understandable confusion.”

BC @ #13: Why do you have to use epithets to describe the people with whom you disagree? Is it that you think anyone who disagrees with you must be demented and dumb? Also, when you say that the alumni of PSU are included in the “right wind numbnuts” what are you saying that a PSU education? That it produces numbnuts? Think through what you say.

As for the “current scientific consensus,” currently we are being continually bombarded by how hollow that term is. The IPCC said the glaciers in the Himalayas were melting – they’re not, and there was never any scientific evidence that they were, so that claim has been demolished; the IPCC blamed the thinning of the Amazon rain forest on global warming, but it’s been thinned because of other reasons, and so that claim is demolished; the IPCC said that the sub-Saharan agricultural will be devastated by 2020 because of lack of rain – another falsehood just recently exposed, and so that claim is demolished; the official New Zealand and Australian weather trends which showed a steady increase in temperature for those tow countries for the last century – shown to be highly questionable if not false when non-warmists gold hold of the unprocessed data, and so I would consider that claim demolished; Mann’s hockey stick which erased the Medieval Warm Period – not peer reviewed and and shown to untrue, demolished; the usefulness of the Bifra tree ring data to determine the MWP temperatures, shown to be fudged (that’s what “hide the decline” was about)and so his data showing no MWP are invalid, and so the claim of no MWP, demolished; and then there are the cooling temperatures of the last decade, and so the claim that CO2 leads global warming, demolished the IPCC forecast of ever rising temperatures, and, in particular, the IPCC’s 2001 forecast as based on their models falsified by declining temperatures of the last decade, and , so, demolishing any claim that the models are accurate. Tell me, BC, what additional evidence would do you need to give up this hypothesis of AGW, given how devastating the evidence has been to that hypothesis?